


the internet was a mistake

by jaybaker



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, Gen, Inspired By Tumblr, M/M, Meet-Cute, Non-Binary Jean Prouvaire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:02:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 17,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26173900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaybaker/pseuds/jaybaker
Summary: Courfeyrac is a PhD student, activist and web comic artist. He’s also known for rambling about his life on twitter, including the butterfly expert he saw on TV, who was really cute.Combeferre is said butterfly expert (“it’s called entomologist, please”), who has never felt the dread of liking an ages-old post of someone he doesn’t know before, mainly because up until now, he never low-key cyber-stalked a stranger.This changes when someone apparently randomly follows him on twitter and he gives into his curiosity to find out more about this guy, whose twitter handle says “@ofcourf”.
Relationships: Combeferre/Courfeyrac (Les Misérables)
Comments: 21
Kudos: 41





	1. beautiful butterfly guy

**Author's Note:**

> this fanfiction was inspired by a tumblr post that you can find here: https://thisisjaybaker.tumblr.com/post/614592507866677248/this-would-be-a-cute-idea-for-a-courferre-au-that (me being unable to properly link will be a recurring theme in this fic)

It is a universal truth that some days are just plain shit. It is another universal truth that you are allowed to treat yourself kindly when experiencing such a day.

For Courfeyrac, treating himself nicely meant watching nature documentaries on TV, because sometimes humans were the worst and nothing was as soothing as learning about how the rest of the world – the universe, really – doesn’t need humans to exist.

Neither the sun nor the moon or any other planet needed humans to exist. Not even the earth needed the humans. Plants didn’t need humans to exist. Animals historically didn’t need humans to exist until humans decided to make some of them co-dependents of a system rigged against their benefit.

Courfeyrac’s favorite documentaries were those about space – not space travel, just the deep and empty void of space – and the abyssal sea; the kind where no human could go and only the monstrous kinds of fish lived. He had no such luck today.

He zapped past a soap opera, a movie from the 90s and a game show. France 5 was airing a documentary; there were some things that were just reliable in this crazy world.

It was a documentary about moths and while those were by far not Courfeyrac’s favorite animals – they were kind of creepy, weren’t they? – he leaned back on the sofa and let the voice-over speaker tell him about how moths disguise themselves as inedible insects to not be eaten.

He had taken all the measures to ensure he would have a nice evening by himself: hot chocolate, some leftover cookies Jehan had brought to the meeting on Wednesday, an assurance from Marius that he wouldn’t be home all night and the knowledge that he did not have to speak to anyone else before 2pm the next day.

He really, really was keen on being alone right now. The whole week had been incredibly draining; work, two meetings, a little family crisis and _more work_.

None of this had come as a surprise. It was the end of the semester; his sister had given him a warning that she had some news their mom would not like and their collective had begun casting for their next play. Thus, people wanted to talk to him _all the time_.

This was not an inherently bad thing, Courfeyrac loved people, he loved talking to people, really. But right now he had just so much on his plate because next to all of this he was still writing his PhD thesis. And people seemed to forget about this, constantly.

So, right now, Courfeyrac was looking forward to some alone time; time to watch documentaries, drink hot chocolate and sleep very long and hopefully very well. The next morning he would sleep in and then he would hopefully still have some time until he met up with Jehan, so he could work on the next issue of his comic.

This was usually what he did in-between the meetings and classes and studying that made up the rest of his life. It was usually what grounded him and gave him some space for himself. But this last week, he had not touched his sketching pad even once. There had been no time. Or there had been time but no energy to do anything. And at one point there had just been so many voices, so many scraps of all the people talking to him, talking at him, for the whole day, that he could not find the right head space to start doing anything.

But now, he was on his own. He didn’t _have to_ listen to anyone, he could choose to. He didn’t _have to_ talk to anyone, he could choose to. Just having the option gave him room to breathe. However, inherently, Courfeyrac _liked_ to listen to people and he liked _talking_ to people, too.

While he was still feeling like personal contact would be draining his batteries, he opted for shouting out into the void and opened twitter. Courfeyrac was one of those people who came to twitter to vent, to let out random thoughts and to get an idea of what was happening in the world right now.

Twitter was the app he opened when he just needed a break of his everyday life between classes. It was the app he opened to tell off the asshole who had called him a slur while driving by. It was the app he opened when he was watching a documentary and the expert they were interviewing was _really cute_.

The latter was not an isolated incident like one might think. Intelligence was sexy, scientists often were adorable dorks and Courfeyrac had a soft spot for people who had unusual interests.

He also developed crushes really easily. Baristas, shop assistants, staff at the doctor’s office and staff at university, people in the library, actors and activists he met at protests, et cetera et cetera.

So, telling his twitter followers that there was, yet again, a cute scientist on TV, was really not that unusual for Courfeyrac.

 _@ofcourf_ : there is a guy on tv who puts the sexy in entomology

 _@ofcourf_ : i know there’s no sexy in entomology, don’t @ me! he literally puts it in there though

 _@ofcourf_ : i never found moths so appealing as i do rn. tell me more beautiful moth man

 _@ofcourf_ : i cant call him moth man, can i? no no no

 _@ofcourf_ : lets call him butterfly guy until i remember to look at the name plate they blend in

 _@ofcourf_ : ok im dying he just called butterflies overappreciated because they are just the beautiful daylight cousins

 _@ofcourf_ : they are the twilight vampires to his nosferatu moths

 _@ofcourf_ : i am swaying, i just learnt that there are b e a u t i f u l m o t h s ?!?!

 _@ofcourf_ : tell me more about beautiful moths you beautiful human

 _@ofcourf_ : g o d !! he popped open a button of his shirt between scenes O_O

 _@ofcourf_ : i ~dig it~

 _@ofcourf_ : (((( i’d also dick it iykwim ))))

 _@ofocurf_ : he made a joke

 _@ofcourf_ : i didn’t get it but,,,,, his s m i l e OMG

 _@ofcourf_ : this smile / and the twinkle in those eyes / inside this beautiful brain / lies what gives me life / wouldn’t that be nice

 _@ofcourf_ : someone read this out at our wedding pls

 _@ofcourf_ : joke! …unless

 _@ofcourf_ : shit I forgot to look at the name plate again

 _@ofcourf_ : in my defense: how could i look away from this face long enough to read anything

 _@ofcourf_ ; more pictures of beautiful moths…can we go back to the beautiful human, pls?

 _@ofcourf_ : wait w h a t?? no!!!! you cant just change experts!!!!

 _@ofcourf_ : bring back beautiful butterfly guy!!!

 _@ofcourf_ : he still had so much to say :(((

 _@ofcourf_ : they m u s t bring him back on screen! they must!

 _@ofcourf_ : they didn’t :(((((((((((((

 _@ofcourf_ : now I’m sad :(((((

 _@ofcourf_ : have to sleep away the sad, see you later

 _@ofcourf_ : hope i don’t dream of ugly moths only beautiful ones pls

Over the course of the weekend Courfeyrac kept thinking back to moths, butterflies and beautiful butterfly guy. It was not entirely his fault, though. He was not that kind of obsessed.

But when Marius came back from his date night with Cosette he talked about the butterfly exhibition they went to and then Jehan brought up Courf’s tweets when they met up later on Saturday.

Jehan had been very amused about Courf’s lacking knowledge of Lepidoptera (moths & butterflies, as they explained to a confused Courfeyrac). Even more amusing, according to Jehan, was that Courf could not really remember much of what had been explained about moths.

So, because his friends kept talking about it, it was really not that strange that he kept thinking about it, right? He even ended up searching for the documentary online. Successfully so.

Beautiful butterfly guy was called Combeferre Auguste, doctor of entomology at the University of Paris-Saclay. And he had a twitter that Courfeyrac found easily, because parents rarely gave their children seldom last names as first names – well, except for his own parents.

His twitter only stated his first name and his bio read: “nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come”.

He mostly retweeted announcements of exhibitions, petitions and protests- some of which Courfeyrac had taken part in. Sometimes he tweeted on his own: venting about the supermarket being out of oat milk for over a week, people smoking at the metro station, his friend not cherishing their own work; which was cute.

Courfeyrac joined butterfly guy’s 93 followers, happy to at least now have a name to the face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello beautiful people!
> 
> i started this fic on a whim and i have no idea yet how long it will be or when the next part will be up.  
>  if you want to bug me about it, come visit my tumblr @/thisisjaybaker :)
> 
> also: thanks to Kerstin for beta-ing!
> 
> until then, everyone stay safe and take care,  
>  Jay :)


	2. at the other end of the void

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (((quick disclaimer: all the links in the chapter were totally made up by me. for most of the stuff i checked whether there were profiles linked to the names and i'm 90% sure that i did not link to an actual site by accident.)))

Combeferre was no regular user of twitter. He knew that there were people who spent the majority of their day with it. Enjolras sometimes did that, when ‘something big’ was happening and even though Combeferre understood his motives he could not imagine doing that.

He was so neglectful of twitter that he sometimes entirely forgot he actually had an account until he opened a link and it opened in the app. Or until Enjolras sent him something on twitter. Or until he got a notification that he had a new follower.

There were now 94 of them; the latest had joined while Combeferre had been asleep.

 _@ofcourf_ is now following you!

This was insofar remarkable as Combeferre’s account was – since he neglected it – very inactive. He mostly posted when Enjolras made him aware of something or when they were promoting a protest. Otherwise he rarely found his way onto twitter.

Most of his followers were people he knew personally. The others had joined, when Enjolras had retweeted something from Combeferre, because Enjolras – way more active on twitter – had a comparably big following.

Out of curiosity, Combeferre opened the profile of @ofcourf while drinking his morning coffee. It read:

**Courfeyrac**  
_@ofcourf_

[he/him] here, queer & just so we’re clear: fuck TERFs <3  
creator of _@queerintales_  
member of _@tempsdramatiques_

Combeferre had heard of _temps dramatiques_ before. It was a theatre collective of queer activists, according to Eponine. She had visited their last three plays because she had a crush on one of the actors that she did not admit. Officially, she stated they made activist theatre that was PG enough to take Gavroche there.

‘Ferre opened the link to the Queerin Tales, which was apparently a web-comic, ‘finding the queer and putting the queer in human stories of all times’. He caught himself trying to follow another link, which was admittedly the purpose of having links in twitter bios, but which was something Combeferre usually never did.

So he went back to @ofcourf’s personal profile. His aim had been to find out who this person was that had started to follow him randomly. He still had no idea how this had happened.

Courfeyrac did not sound like a first name, but it was the only name given and Combeferre felt like this guy might have thought the same about his profile. Courfeyrac seemed like a very active twitter user, he had made over 10,000 tweets in about seven years.

He had pinned a tweet that read:

 _@ofcourf:_ when people assume I’m pretentious  
because I’m in grad school  
they are technically correct, which is  
the worst kind of correct

Combeferre smiled at that. He could remember the days of writing his thesis very well; it had not been long ago after all. Enjolras had regularly rambled about the pretentiousness of PhD-programs – it was a necessary evil, though, as far as Combeferre was concerned. It was hard to earn your living spending your days thinking about Lepidoptera without a PhD.

@ofcourf was apparently an English or a theater student because a considerable amount of his tweets had to do with Shakespeare. He also had a dramatic streak apparently, posting things like

 _@ofcourf:_ oh to live in a world without the knowledge  
of Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet adaption  
i envy thee, @jhnprvr!! (but also how come  
i never forced you to watch this with me???)

Combeferre had no opinion on the matter of Kenneth Branagh’s adaption of anything; he had only ever seen him as Professor Lockhart in the Harry Potter movies. This probably showed the limited range of his knowledge when it came to theatre. Still, he had a feeling that this Courfeyrac had a rather strong opinion.

Maybe the mixture of this theatrical streak, strong opinions about niche topics and the general engagement in discussions was what made the twitter feed of @ofcourf so entertaining.

Combeferre scrolled back through the tweets of the last few days, which were about 50 or so, and it was probably the longest Combeferre had ever scrolled back at any profile. Then, a few days back he found a tweet that read

 _@ofcourf_ : there is a guy on tv who puts the sexy in entomology

And entomology was something so specific that Combeferre could not imagine this being a coincidence. He opened the thread that followed this initial tweet and apparently, Courfeyrac the webcomic-artist had seen the documentary that Combeferre had consulted in on TV. And apparently, he had…liked him?

It was very strange to read this thread. He was a bit flattered, but also wondering why someone would write something like this on the internet. Yes, he probably never expected Combeferre to find this – which made him feel like he was invading the privacy of this stranger by reading it. Still, it was about him and it was kind of weird, right?

Combeferre didn’t know what to do with this or what to think about this, so he just impulsively closed the app and decided not to think about this anymore.

This, of course, did not work.

The whole day his mind went back to Courfeyrac over and over again.

While his rambling about Combeferre had made the latter a bit uncomfortable, it was not necessarily a bad feeling. His words had scratched a nerve. He had made Combeferre wonder; about who this guy was and about how it would be to be looked at in this way all the time.

It had been years since Combeferre had dated anyone. Grad school was stressful and his most intense social contacts were basically un-dateable; Enjolras and Grantaire were partners, Eponine was as gay as Combeferre and Bossuet and Joly were neither his type nor available.

Courfeyrac was cute – judging by the one selfie he had posted on twitter two days ago and his profile picture which was a comic version of the guy in the selfie. Also, he was interesting. He was invested in a variety of things that Combeferre was not even aware of, but he was also an activist like ‘Ferre, so they had to have more things in common then dark hair and a strange not-a-first-name first name.

In the end, it was inevitable: at home, later this night, Combeferre was back on Courfeyrac’s twitter. He had tweeted four times today.

 _@ofcourf:_ everybody go listen to my friend @jhnprvr  
reading their poetry in aesthetically pleasing  
surroundings <https://youtube.com/jhnprvr>

_@ofcourf:_ free hugs in front of the bibliothèque georges  
brassens (not by me, but other nice people) <3

 _@ofcourf:_ i wish i had time to give out free hugs on a  
monday morning instead of running late for  
class

 _@ofcourf:_ “some are born great, some achieve greatness,  
and some have great ideas what to write in  
their thesis until they have to actually write it”  
\- Shakespeare, probably, if he lived today

The latest tweet made Combeferre smile. He scrolled further down Courfeyrac’s tweets until he had passed the thread about him. On the same day of the thread, there had only been one other tweet:

 _@ofcourf:_ i dreamt of babies tonight…  
any Freud fans here who want to tell me  
something about me i never wanted to know??

It was weird. Combeferre had never been interested in sharing these random but kind of personal things with strangers on the internet. For him the strangers you would reach on platforms like twitter were like a void he had no knowledge of.

If he was sending something out into this unknown, it should be something worthwhile. It should serve a purpose; information, a call to action, anything. That was why his tweets were mostly retweets of protest announcements or reviews of exhibitions or news stories.

He had tried to do the “calling out into the void” thing. From time to time he would tweet something about how Grantaire was too self-deprecating – without naming him, of course – or about the broken coffee machine in the office. Doing this felt unimportant, however.

Courfeyrac’s tweets felt different. He was a whole personality on twitter. He took the space he needed for himself and shared these speckles of his life and seemed uncaring of the infinite depth of the void he was shouting into.

Combeferre had never ‘gotten’ the internet. Neither the appeal nor the hang of it. But Courfeyrac seemed comfortable, he was telling the internet about his life and he was involved in a webcomic. He probably knew more about the internet than how to use it for research. Maybe his knowledge made him more willing to ignore the void.

He had scrolled back more than four months before he eventually followed one of the links to the webcomic.

 _Queerin Tales_ was at its 37th installment and had apparently started more than 2 years ago. Besides the 37 issues, there were about 200 comic strips that were titled as ‘Outtakes’ or ‘Bonus’. There were Christmas editions and anniversary specials. The sheer amount of work the creator had invested was so impressive.

Courfeyrac Corbin was listed as author, artist and editor in general. Sometimes there were other names in the credits for single issues. Combeferre recognized Jehan Prouvaire as probably the person Courfeyrac mentioned semi-regularly in his tweets.

It was a very good comic. The art was simple – bold lines, mellow colors, uncrowded panels. The characters – there were two protagonists, some recurring characters and new characters every issue – were quirky but loveable. The story was nice and catching. Though all the issues basically followed the same structure it always felt innovative.

Combeferre was only able to pass a judgment after reading 10 issues. He only stopped because his phone gave him a battery warning. So he closed his browser and he wanted to close twitter, too, but his tired fumbling didn’t close the app. It liked the 4 months-old tweet he had followed the link from.

Combeferre had never before experienced the dread of liking an ages-old post of someone. He had also never before low-key cyber-stalked a stranger. But it was too late now, because this had happened.

Could he un-like this without Courfeyrac noticing? Was this a thing? He really had no idea of how twitter worked.

After a moment of frozen horror, he decided that he was over-reacting. He did not need to be ashamed of his interest in who Courfeyrac was. According to his own tweets Courfeyrac was at least a bit interested in who Combeferre was as well. Otherwise he would not have followed him on twitter, right?

So, Combeferre could just own up to his behavior and directly contact Courfeyrac. He scrolled back up – and yes, it took forever to do so. He pressed the ‘follow’-button and then the little envelope.

_‘Hello Courfeyrac, I wanted to thank you for the follow. I feel flattered that you liked the documentary. I’m in awe of your comic, it is really well-made and I’m looking forward to seeing more of it! Combeferre_ _:)_ _’_

Was this too awkward? Probably. He hit ‘Send’ anyway and then it was too late to take it back. Now it was not on him, the ball was in Courfeyrac’s court and Combeferre was adamant on not investing in any feelings of worry or hope.

He just went to bed, trying to think of something else, but failing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello lovely people!
> 
> first off: credits!  
> Courfeyrac's pinned tweet was inspired by a tumblr post post from phdblr (where i keep heading for inspiration and i'm so impressed by all of these people).   
> [also i fail at creating working hyperlinks, so here's the link to copy: https://phdstudents.tumblr.com/post/154589039687/when-people-assume-im-pretentious-because-im-in]
> 
> thank you for all the love and the comments!
> 
> Combeferre has no idea how to use twitter, because i have no idea of twitter. i actually created an account for research purposes but i still ask my two twitter-savvy friends about everything.
> 
> another shoutout and lots of love to Kerstin for proof-reading again this because i'm a menace when it comes to commas and she deserves all the praise for putting up with me (this is me buttering her up for doing it the next times around) :)
> 
> until next time, everyone stay safe and take care,  
> Jay :)


	3. the internet was a mistake

On Tuesdays, Courf only had to be at University at 11 o’clock which meant he could sleep in until nine, have a big breakfast with Marius and then get to the office with time to spare. This was one of the reasons why Tuesday was Courfeyrac’s favorite day of the week – well, of the work week.

The other major reason was that the meetings of _temps dramatiques_ were on Tuesday evening. They also met on Thursdays but since Courfeyrac’s Thursday started with an alarm at 6 o’clock he was already worn down from the day when the time came to finally meet his friends.

Courfeyrac’s Tuesday-alarm was of course different than the alarm he used to wake up at six in the morning. Waking up at nine asked for another level of intensity and sensibility. His nine o’clock alarm usually did not wake him from deep slumber but from soft drowsing.

On Tuesdays Courf rose to the sound of Edith Piaf. She was his mother’s favorite singer and he had grown up with her songs. Hearing her voice first thing in the morning gave him a home-y feeling, setting just the right mood for his Tuesday.

Courf had a very important not-checking-his-notifications-before-breakfast-rule that was implemented on the days he had heaps of time – Tuesday, Saturday and Sunday. Musichetta had suggested this to him after he had ranted one too many times about how draining social media could be especially first thing in the morning.

She was right of course. With some coffee in his system and a croissant on his belly it was way easier to handle twitter drama – and real life, real world drama. Also, having breakfast with Marius put things into perspective. Courfeyrac loved his best friend an absurd amount but he was kind of ridiculous most of the time and his endearing naivety took the edge off of almost anything.

Marius was also the one who always took care of having fresh croissants for breakfast. He was physically unable to sleep past 8 o’clock so he usually went out for a morning stroll and came back with pastry just in time for breakfast. He usually set the table while Courfeyrac made coffee and boiled some eggs and then they sat down and enjoyed the morning together.

Marius would tell some story about his work or about Cosette – mostly the latter because his life revolved around his girlfriend in a borderline creepy but consensual way. Courfeyrac’s Tuesday mornings were reserved for light conversation, for teasing Marius a bit, for getting into a day without stress.

Around ten the two of them usually split up to get ready for work. Marius mostly worked from home – he was a translator and editor for a textbook publisher – so he just settled in the office they had created in the spare room. Courfeyrac packed his bag and some lunch for later then left for the metro station.

At the station Courfeyrac started to look through his notifications. He had checked his emails and his group chats before since those were too important or not random enough to leave them unchecked for two waking hours. But twitter, tumblr, facebook, instagram and co. were really not important enough to check before breakfast. And they were actually a great way to pass the time of his commute.

He swiped away all notifications about new followers and likes on any platform. He was used to sometimes gaining a hundred followers a day with his QT-accounts. And it was Tuesday so at midnight a queued up comic strip had been published and had already had the chance to go viral in the USA.

This had happened only once but Courf had gotten used to random growth spurts in his follower count. It was however still unusual that someone dm-ed him on twitter on his personal account. And when Courf saw the name of the person who had messaged him he halted for a second.

It was beautiful butterfly guy.

Beautiful butterfly guy had dm-ed him. And it wasn’t only the fact _that_ he had texted, it was _what_ he had texted that startled Courfeyrac.

_‘Hello Courfeyrac, I wanted to thank you for the follow. I feel flattered that you liked the documentary. I’m in awe of your comic, it is really well-made and I’m looking forward to seeing more of it! Combeferre :)’_

This seemed to imply that he had read Courfeyrac’s tweets about him, right? If he saw that Courf had seen the documentary than he must’ve seen his _thirsty_ tweets. Oh god. Had butterfly guy actually scrolled so far? Courfeyrac had probably made more than two dozen tweets between last night – when the dm had been sent – and Friday night.

And he had read his comic. Or at least parts of it – apparently enough of it to form an opinion. It was official: Courfeyrac was having a bit of a meltdown. On the metro. Because of one little message. He felt overly dramatic, but this was kind of his thing after all.

He decided not to answer directly. Instead he took a screenshot and sent it to Jehan. He texted them ‘ _call me when you saw this_ ’ and ten minutes later he was on the phone with them.

“So, am I right to assume this Combeferre is ‘beautiful butterfly guy’?” Jehan asked instead of a greeting. They always got down straight to business on the phone – they hated ‘talking through machines’.

“Yes,” Courfeyrac answered trying to entail all his exasperation in the one word. “What do I do now? Do I answer? If yes, what do I answer?”

“Well, darling, what _do_ you want to do?”

“I want the earth to open up and swallow me whole,” he answered.

Jehan was not impressed by this answer. “That would be a silly response, don’t you think?”

“Well, you asked what I want to do. Maybe I want to be silly.”

“I’m more so under the impression that you are trying to be difficult,” Jehan answered but Courfeyrac could practically hear them smile. “What do you think he wants from you?”

“I don’t know. Care to share your thoughts?”

“Well, he said he wanted to thank you for following him, but I feel like he mostly wanted to reach out. He is apparently impressed and seems interested.” Jehan suggested. “Or he’s just incredibly awkward on the internet and actually thanks every one of his followers by texting them.”

“Could be the latter. I mean, he signed a dm,” Courfeyrac answered, still pondering on Jehan’s question. “Maybe it is that. It must be that, right?”

“Do you want me to follow him, too? We’d see if I get a dm as well,” Jehan proposed.

“Don’t you dare. He’ll know it’s got something to do with me. He’ll see that we are linked.”

“So? Why do you care?”

That was an excellent question, to be perfectly honest. Courfeyrac himself was not really sure why he cared so much. Or better; why he didn’t know what to do. He was a people-person, someone who could hold a conversation with about anyone. So, what was the problem here?

“Is this a serious crush we’re talking about?” Jehan asked after a minute of silence from Courfeyrac.

“Well…no, I mean, I don’t know the guy, right?” Courfeyrac answered hesitantly. A lack of personal acquaintance had never meant that he couldn’t crush on people but a _serious crush_ needed more than a documentary and some online-stalking.

“You could get to know him though. He kinda opened that door for you, didn’t he?” Jehan rejoined. They sounded carefully optimistic.

“I wouldn’t want to assume anything like that. Maybe he really is just an awkward thanks-for-the-follow guy.” Courfeyrac tried to reason less with Jehan and more with himself.

“Well, sweetheart, you know don’t need to make this decision right now. You’re on your way to the office, right?”

“Yeah, I’m actually almost there,” Courf answered, tilting his head to look towards the window of his third-floor office.

“Then take the rest of the day to think about it or to suppress the thought with work. Whatever works best for you,” Jehan proposed. They sounded a tiny bit concerned, it was so sweet. “We can talk about it tonight after the meeting, right?”

“Right, yeah. Let’s do that,” he answered, taking a deep breath. He really didn’t know why this had aggravated him so much. But he was grateful for Jehan’s existence and for their patience. “Thank you, really. See you tonight. Love you.”

“Love you, too.” Jehan said then the call ended.

***

Courfeyrac did not consciously decide to follow either of Jehan’s suggestions: thinking about the dm-dilemma – as he had christened his problem – all day or trying to banish it from his thoughts with loads of work. But both things kind of happened over the course of the day.

Eventually, though, he had come to the following conclusions:

1) He had to decide how to interpret Combeferre’s message or better: Combeferre’s intent. Was he interested in starting a conversation or was he just polite?

2) He had to decide whether or not he himself had the intent to start/hold a conversation. Was he interested or should he just give a polite acknowledgement of the message?

3) If their intents did not match it would be a bit awkward.

4) Awkwardness was not that bad and this was a stranger on the internet, so it wouldn’t kill Courfeyrac even if it did turn out to be a mess.

5) He knew all this rationally, but he was still unsure how to proceed, because it was a crush and when you’re crushing on someone you don’t really make sense all the time.

6) The worst thing about this was that he could not tweet the whole day, because he felt it would have been impolite to not answer the message once he gave a sign of life on twitter otherwise.

Jehan, in the evening, was impressed by Courf’s comprehensive list of conclusions but they still laughed at him.

“I thought about it, too. And I came to the following conclusion:”, they made a dramatic pause, which was – to be honest - fair. But also kind of aggravating, “Just answer, whatever comes to your mind. You know, like any conversation. You are good with conversations.”

“Jehan, that is so unhelpful,” Courfeyrac whined, but Jehan laughed again.

“If you don’t want to listen to me you still have all our friends to ask for other advice,” they told him.

He sighed and looked to Marius and Cosette, who were sharing one chair and talking animatedly about something. They were so in love and had been for four years, Courfeyrac knew from experience that they were very bad at giving advice to singles. They were lovely, yes, but also nauseating sometimes.

Bahorel and Feuilly had not arrived yet, which was why the meeting hadn’t started yet. So, his one option was Musichetta who was in the kitchen to prepare some coffee – Feuilly lived by coffee some days. But Courfeyrac knew exactly what Musichetta would tell him.

“If you want it, go and try to get it,” she’d say, “You need to put yourself out there sometimes, and if you mess up, that’s life. So, do you think it’d be worth it?” ‘Chetta was a big fan of ‘daring to love’ and stuff like this. She was crazy brave when it came to her own heart.

Courfeyrac wasn’t sure if he could be like that but maybe he wanted to be.

“Did you come to a conclusion while staring at the kitchen door?” Jehan asked when Courfeyrac kept quiet.

Courf sighed and hid his face in his hands. “I had an epiphany.”

“Is that so?” Jehan asked.

“The internet was a mistake.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello wonderful people!
> 
> thank you for every comment, every kudos, every read etc. <3
> 
> this story will probably end up being 6-10 chapters, because i write approx. a chapter per week and i want to finish this before nano begins. i currently have the next three chapters mapped out and am looking forward to sharing it with you :)
> 
> until then, everybody stay safe & take care,
> 
> Jay :)


	4. the depth of the void

Combeferre had come to the conclusion that Courfeyrac must have fallen off the face of the earth. It had been five days since he had messaged him and not only had he not answered; he had also not tweeted anything in those five days.

He was probably just busy. Very busy.

Combeferre was very busy himself. It was the end of the semester. His students were nervous about their exams, the zoo wanted him to choose an applicant for the internship position they offered during the study break and he had two papers to write – one for a journal and one for a conference.

He was so busy, indeed, that he had missed two meetings of Les Amis de l’ABC in a row – which had only happened once before when he had to prepare for his thesis defense while also applying for a job at the department.

One could probably question why, if he had no time whatsoever, he knew exactly that Courfeyrac had been inactive not only on twitter but also on any other social media accounts – except for the queued up release of his comic. Combeferre had no real answer for this question, though.

The other man had only crossed his mind occasionally and he had then used some of those spare minutes every day offers in-between more important tasks to open the app with the little white bird. So what? He wouldn’t think too much of it. Really.

It was Saturday evening now and Combeferre had just in this moment sent off his entry for the conference in September. This had been the last piece of work he had to do for the week. He had been adamant to try and have his Sunday as a day free of work.

He had a book waiting for him to read it on the bedside table and some friends he had not seen for the whole week to probably meet up with. He decided to call Enjolras to ask for his plans and to get an update on what the ABC had been planning. He knew his best friend well enough to be sure he was waiting for Combeferre to signal he was not busy anymore before he’d call.

Enjolras picked up his phone after the third ring.

“Hello?” Enjolras was one of those people who did not look at the caller ID before picking up no matter how big the phone screen showed it.

“Hello Enjolras, it’s Combeferre,” he greeted and heard a grateful sigh from the other end, “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, yeah. Your timing is great as always. I take it you are not so busy anymore?” he asked but didn’t wait for an answer, “Do you have time to cover for Eponine at a meeting tomorrow? Gavroche is unwell and she can’t come with me. It’s at 3pm in the 6th arrondissement.”

“Yes, sure, I’m free. What kind of meeting is this?” Combeferre asked. He heard Grantaire’s voice in the background of the call. He checked the time and concluded that R had probably prepared dinner for them; he always tried his best to get Enjolras to stop working around dinner time on the weekend.

“Uhm, I kind of…” Enjolras answered, he sounded conflicted.

“You need to go. No problem. Give my best to Grantaire. I’m going to call Eponine to give me the details, just text me the address, alright?” Combeferre offered.

“You truly are the best, ‘Ferre, you know that, right?” He could hear the smile in his friend’s voice. “I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

“Yes. _À demain!_ ” Combeferre ended the call and directly switched to call Éponine. He got her voicemail the first two times so he decided to make himself some dinner then try again.

When he called again she answered after the first ring.

“Glad to see you’re back from the overworked,” she greeted him.

“Glad to be back. How’s your brother?” Combeferre asked.

“He’s alright. He’s adjusting to new meds. He’ll be fine, though, there’s no need to worry, I just don’t want to leave him alone for long,” she said and her calmness relieved Combeferre.

A few years ago Combeferre would not have been sure whether it was really all fine but by now Eponine knew that she could rely on him and didn’t try to hide anything anymore. “I take it you’ve talked to Enj?”

“Yes, I have. He mentioned some kind of meeting tomorrow,” Combeferre said but posed it as a question.

“Are you covering for me?”

“Yeah. Can you give me a run-down of what this is about? Enjolras didn’t really have time to tell me much.”

“Did you call during dinner?” He could hear the smile in Eponine’s voice. “Didn’t check the time before calling, did you?”

“You know us all too well,” Combeferre smiled as well, “so?”

“Okay, you remember this theatre group I told you guys about a few months back? They are called _temps dramatiques_ ,” Eponine didn’t notice because they were on the phone but Combeferre was pretty sure that he turned either red as a tomato or white as a sheet.

“Enjolras ran into one of them last weekend, his name’s Feuilly. And he was _so impressed_. If it had been five years ago Grantaire would have instantly hated the guy, because Enjolras was basically swooning.” She was silent for a second, maybe she wanted to conjure a picture for Combeferre to see but he was still distracted by his wandering thoughts.

“So anyway, he met the guy at a second hand market or some other charity thingy and they had both heard of each other and bonded over the oppression of queer people in Poland apparently.” This did not sound unlikely. Enjolras met a lot of people when he was out and about and if they impressed him he would get them to come and visit the ABC and well, most of them had stuck.

“So now they want to talk about a possible cooperation. The _temps_ people are working on their next project and they need way more people than they usually get to participate, so Enjolras offered to talk to us about it and get together soon,” Eponine explained further.

“That’s what tomorrow’s supposed to be. We decided, we’d like to hear what they are planning and probably collaborate. Enjolras is back to rejecting his position as our fearless leader, so he asked for someone to come with and I volunteered but now I can’t go,” she sounded genuinely sad about this, “so…yeah. You’ll basically be there to contribute whatever comes to your mind and to make Enj feel as if he’s not our official leader in things like this.”

She paused for a second then added: “I can send you the minutes of our last meetings if you want to catch up. Joly was taking the notes so they are orderly and readable.”

Combeferre nodded, trying to keep up with her explanation. “Yeah, that would be nice,” he said and he could tell that he sounded distracted. Eponine noticed this as well, of course she did.

“Is everything ok?” she asked. “You sound…off. If you can’t make it tomorrow I’m sure R would step up. You had such a stressful week, we’d all understand if you wanted to just sleep all day tomorrow.”

She sounded genuinely concerned now, so he interrupted her before she worried too much. “It’s not that. Believe me; I wouldn’t have volunteered if I didn’t have the time and the energy. Don’t worry.”

“Alright, good. Do you want to talk about it? Whatever it is?”

“Well,” he paused for a moment. Eponine on the other end was silent, giving him room to think. Eventually he sighed, “I just – I got a crush. And I don’t even know him personally. But he’ll potentially be there tomorrow, because he’s a member of _temps dramatiques_.”

“Which one is it? I didn’t even know you knew them,” her voice contained some form of excitement.

“His name’s Courfeyrac and I know him from twitter…Well kind of.”

“From twitter? That’s unusual. I wasn’t even sure you were using twitter!”

“Yeah, I’m usually not.” Combeferre sighed and put his face in the hand he was not holding the phone with. “I got a notification that he started following me so I checked out his account and he apparently saw this documentary that I was in and he liked me? I mean he tweeted about me and…I don’t know. He seems cute and I feel stupid.”

“Don’t.” She was quiet for a moment. “Do you want to come over? I have wine and ice cream and we can lament about being gay and single. We haven’t done this in ages.”

It really had been ages. Because Combeferre did not talk about his romantic feelings all that much and because he did not even have such feelings really often. He had genuinely surprised himself with this crush. And Eponine had seemed happily single for the last few months, but maybe this had only been a wrong conclusion on Combeferre’s part.

“That sounds great. I can be there in an hour.”

“Perfect!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello lovely people!
> 
> here's a link to a petition for the eu to intervene in Poland and make the country safer for lgbt+ people: http://chng.it/ffDtHXX2F6
> 
> i hope you enjoyed the chapter! i always kind of hate to write dialogue, so I hope this doesn't show, oops :D
> 
> the next chapter is almost finished, so i think i'll be able to stick to posting every sunday :)
> 
> until then, everyone stay safe and take care,  
> Jay :)


	5. how to ghost someone 101: don't meet them in person

When Feuilly had told his friends that he had run into one of the guys of _Les Amis de l’ABC_ they had all been thrilled. There were only so many queer activist groups in Paris and they had of course heard of them before. They had even made plans to ask for cooperation before but due to this and that and then some other reason it had never actually happened before.

But now it was happening. And it had been awesome timing. They had begun the casting process for their next project but they would need more people. Certainly more than the six of them and the three to five people they could usually attract as actors and helpers.

_Les Amis_ were around half a dozen people themselves and they had connections and roots in other parts of the Parisian communities. Feuilly was so thrilled. He had really connected to Enjolras – who was known as the _ABC_ ’s kind of unofficial leader even though he didn’t seem to like being called that.

To Courfeyrac this sounded a lot like Feuilly. While _temps dramatiques_ was an anti-authoritarian collective there had to be someone to lead the meetings, someone to represent them to the public, someone to bundle their organization – and that someone was Feuilly. Nobody ever called him their leader but he kind of was.

In an effort to not act as – sole – leaders of their respective groups, Feuilly and Enjolras had agreed to meet two-on-two for the first meeting. Both of their groups had agreed, because trying to bring together all twelve or so of them for a productive meeting would have probably been too much.

So they would talk a bit about their ideas for the project over coffee on Sunday and then merge their groups on another day. It also helped with the timing. Finding a date for four people to meet up was way easier than finding a good time for a dozen people to meet.

They had made the unanimous decision that Courfeyrac should accompany Feuilly because he was usually the showrunner for their projects. He had also developed the concept they were working towards so he’d probably be the one best equipped to explain their idea.

And Courfeyrac really had been willing to go – thrilled to be able to try and sway someone with their ideas. He really liked the café Feuilly and Enjolras had agreed to meet up in and had been looking forward to their carrot cake. Spending the afternoon with Feuilly was also very nice. Usually the other man was always very busy.

This list of ‘reasons he had agreed to do this’ only really became relevant when he was confronted with a reason not to do so. Because Feuilly pointed towards the people they had been waiting for in the café and one of them turned out to be a certain entomologist he had been ghosting on twitter for the last few days.

_Merde._

The thing was that he had to make a decision – fast. Because while he recognized Combeferre, the beautiful butterfly guy, he was not sure how it was the other way around. At the very least he would surely recognize his name. There were not many people called Courfeyrac. And he probably knew about his involvement in _temps_ from twitter and –

“Are you okay Courf?” Now Feuilly sounded really concerned, “You are kind of pale. If anything’s the case you don’t have to stay, you know? If you don’t feel well, I’ll try to sell the concept as well as I can.”

“No, no, no. Don’t worry, Feuilly. It’s just…I’ll tell you later, ok? But I’m alright and I want and can be here.” He assured his friend just in time before their counterparts from _Les Amis_ reached their table.

Feuilly and Courfeyrac stood up to greet the others, Feuilly squeezing Courfeyrac’s arm reassuringly.

Courfeyrac was kind of swept away by both of them. While one was very clearly Combeferre – the guy he had been crushing on and avoiding, who he had thought about quite a lot in the last week or so, no big deal, right? – the other guy, Enjolras, was just plain beautiful. He was one of those people who just looked so beautiful and had such an aura around them, it was enticing.

He really had to get himself not to stare at either of them.

They did the introductions, shaking hands, saying their names. Had there not been two other people around, Courfeyrac didn’t know if he would have been able to play so cool. Because he was shaking hands and introducing himself to the guy he had been ghosting for a week. And this guy was so nice. His handshake was firm and he smiled at him so nicely while it was so clear that he had recognized him as well.

_God, what was he thinking?_

Feuilly and Enjolras took over the conversation right from the start and they sat down and started talking and Courfeyrac just listened until it was his time to talk. He had a good time watching Feuilly and Enjolras, because he could see really well how those two had ended up meeting and talking for hours. Also, looking at the two of them gave him a reason not to look at Combeferre, who he was very aware of either way.

When their food and drinks had arrived they switched from idle chit-chat to business.

“So, what exactly is your concept? You’re already in the casting phase, right?” Enjolras asked. Feuilly nodded and turned towards Courfeyrac, because this was what the latter was here for. He locked eyes with Enjolras and Combeferre _very briefly_ and then started his monologue.

“Have you guys ever heard of the commedia dell’arte? Or the comédie-italienne?” They both shook their heads. “Alright. I kind of expected that, to be honest. But you need a bit of history to understand what we’re trying to do, so brace yourselves for a short theatre history lesson:”

He looked at Feuilly for a second who seemed amused but nodded encouragingly.

“The commedia dell’arte was an Italian form of theater in the 16th and 17th century. It was played by wandering street companies primarily in Italy but because they were wandering troops they also came to most other central-European countries and influenced theatre there,” Courfeyrac explained fully in his element.

“The plays were based on recognizable stereotypical characters, like the vulgar and hedonistic Harlequin and the greedy mean merchant Pantalone. The story was usually a love story, the two lovers were hindered from marriage by their parents for some stupid reason but the clever and cool servants helped them to a happy ending eventually.” Even though he had switched to his teaching voice Combeferre and Enjolras seemed genuinely interested – bless them.

“It included lots of improv, acrobatics, puns, etc. The characters were developed based on the real world of the times. The commedia always sided with the common people and reflected their situation. It was not didactic but meant for cathartic fun,” Courfeyrac concluded. He made a short pause and took a sip of his tea.

Now they’d arrived at the fun part, their idea: “We want to _update_ the commedia dell’arte to a more political, maybe didactic and absolutely queer version. What we want to keep is maybe the open air plays, much of the improv parts, if possible some of the acrobatics and the cathartic fun.”

Combeferre and Enjolras nodded to show him they were following his words. They were excellent listeners, certainly more engaging than Courfeyrac’s average student.

“The plan is to develop the characters as soon as we have a cast,” He explained further. “I personally would like to have a set of characters that represent polar opposites of each other grouped together or something like this, but this idea is not ripe yet and is something we would have to discuss later.”

He glanced at Feuilly who was smiling serenely at him. “We need at least a dozen actors and it would be great to have five or more people who do the work behind the stage, so even if you as a group decide that this is not up your alley it would be awesome if you could boost our casting call.”

There was a moment of silence after Courfeyrac had ended his monologue. Enjolras and Combeferre were probably letting it all sink in, Feuilly seemed happy to watch them think while he ate his carrot cake.

“That certainly sounds interesting,” Enjolras finally said with a thoughtful look on his face. “What’s the time-frame we’d be working in? Our group was unanimously interested in the collaboration, but we need to know how time-consuming the project would be, as I’m sure you understand.”

“Of course we understand,” Feuilly answered, “We’re still negotiating with the owner of the theater we usually play in and with an open air stage in the fifth arrondissement. We have to find a date before we can apply for financial aids. But the premiere would probably take place in April or early May and we usually play for a month or so, usually on Tuesday and Thursday nights.”

Courfeyrac kind of zoned out when Feuilly and Enjolras started talking about dates and organization stuff. His job here was done, right? So he could not-so subtly stare at Combeferre’s hand play with his fork without feeling bad, right?

Not right.

“Combeferre, what do you think?” Enjolras asked, which was a fair question but when Courfeyrac looked up from Combeferre’s hand the owner of the hand was looking at him curiously and Courfeyrac felt himself blush, which apparently made Combeferre blush in return.

_Oh god._

“I think this sounds like a very viable project. The others will be thrilled to hear about it, I’m sure,” Combeferre answered with a slight delay. Enjolras didn’t seem to notice – or maybe he didn’t show it – but Feuilly looked from Courf to Combeferre and then back to his friend with a smile playing around his lips.

“Agreed,” Enjolras said. Then he looked at Courfeyrac, “Would you like to come to one of our next meetings to explain the idea to the rest of our group? I’m sure you can explain this way better than Combeferre or I could.” He smiled at him angelically; Courfeyrac didn’t even know how to say no anymore.

“Um…yeah, sure. If I can make it time-wise, I’ll be there,” he answered.

“Our next meeting is on Wednesday at seven,” Enjolras offered willingly, his smile had turned softer. Courfeyrac took out his day planner from his knapsack to add it to his schedule.

“Where?”

“I’ll text you the address,” Combeferre offered and for a second he and Courfeyrac stared at each other, because this was the first time that one of them had openly acknowledged that they knew each other. Courfeyrac could see the same slight shock in Combeferre’s eyes that he was sure he displayed as well.

“That would be great,” Courfeyrac answered after a beat of silence, “I’ll give you my phone number. I’m easier to reach there than on twitter.” He hoped the last part didn’t sound as much as a lie as it actually was.

Combeferre nodded with a smile and offered him his phone.

“You two know each other?” Feuilly asked.

“Kind of,” Combeferre answered, not offering more of an explanation, thankfully. Feuilly didn’t ask for more but Courfeyrac was sure he came to some conclusion by himself that he’d like to share later.

Courfeyrac was right. After their good-byes he and Feuilly went home with the same metro while Enjolras and Combeferre walked, since they were meeting up with someone in close vicinity of the café.

“So you and Combeferre knew each other before?” Feuilly asked when they were standing in the metro.

Courfeyrac sighed. “Yes, well, no. Not really. We follow each other on twitter.”

“Where you are supposedly not good to reach?”

God, why did all of his friends know him so well? “Yeah, that was a lie. I’ve been kind of ghosting him on twitter.”

Feuilly looked at him funnily. “You have done what?”

“I swear, it’s not as bad as it sounds.”

“Oh god, Courf, what have you gotten yourself into?” Feuilly asked, slightly shaking his head.

“A huge crush as it seems.”

And Feuilly, can you imagine, had the audacity to laugh at him before he said: “Well, at least that is a mutual thing, I think.”

“I…what?” Courfeyrac had started his answer before his brain had processed Feuilly’s words. “Do you really think that?”

“Do you not?”

Courf sighed again. “I don’t know, Feuilly, that’s kind of the whole problem.”

“How about you tell me the whole story and then we talk it out,” his friend suggested.

“That sounds lovely.” He took out his phone to text Marius that he’d be out longer and saw that he had a new message from an unknown number:

Unknown Number: _Hi, this is Combeferre :)_

He stared at it for a moment, the little smile and the fact that he had texted him hello first instead of just texting him the info they had agreed on made him think. Maybe Feuilly was right. Before he could overthink his answer again he texted back, hopeful to start a real conversation this time. It was not so scary anymore, now that he knew him.

You: _Hi :)_


	6. filling the void

It was Wednesday, shortly before seven pm and Combeferre was nervous for no good reason. At least that was what he told himself. No reason to be nervous just because you’d see your crush again, right? And he’d also meet all of your close friends in the process. Who all knew that you had a crush on this person because they all knew you too well.

_God._

Combeferre was sitting at a table in the Café Musain where _Les Amis_ met and oh well, this was happening. It was kind of absurd. That he, Combeferre, had met someone on twitter and that he had instantly crushed on this person. Both was so…unexpected.

Usually, Combeferre thought of himself as someone who was probably a bit predictable. He liked routines, he liked to be in control; it gave him calmness and strength. He was someone people came to for honest advice and for guidance. He was used to being the one providing comfort for his friends.

He did not leave his own comfort zone often. _Everything to do with Courfeyrac_ was out of his comfort zone. Meeting over twitter, texting before really ever talking to each other, the strange intensity of his crush that developed so fast.

Still, it felt good.

And none of it could be blamed on Courfeyrac who was just so endearing. Every word they exchanged just made Combeferre like him more. He was passionate and clever, humorous, open-hearted and funny. He exuded so much energy, he was radiant. Combeferre was sure that his friends would love Courfeyrac. Enjolras already did, apparently.

Eponine was halfway there as well, from her experience of viewing their last production and her stalking Courfeyrac on social media – against Combeferre’s expressed wishes. This ‘research’, how she had called it, gave Eponine the advantage of recognizing Courfeyrac at the very moment he stepped through the door of the Musain.

“There he is,” she whispered to Combeferre who was sitting with his back to the door for personal reasons, “I’m gonna go say hello.”

With that Eponine stood up and left the table. Combeferre turned to look after her and then his body was already moving and he was following her. She had already introduced herself when he reached the two of them and Courfeyrac was smiling at her, all cheekbones and dimples.

“Combeferre, hello, it’s lovely to see you again,” Courfeyrac greeted him, turning towards him and giving him the same smile so that Combeferre could do nothing but reciprocate.

“Likewise,” he answered because for a moment he forgot how words worked and this was thankfully only two syllables for his brain and mouth to figure out. Another thankful advantage he had in this situation was Eponine who took over gracefully.

“Can I get you something to drink, Courfeyrac, while Combeferre introduces you to the rest of us?” she asked. Courfeyrac looked at her and he took this moment to pull himself together.

“Oh, yes, that would be so kind of you. Any kind of tea would be great.”

“Another tea drinker,” Eponine commented with a look to Combeferre, “not long and we coffee addicts will be outnumbered.” She gave Combeferre a nudge and left towards the bar to order.

“I also drink coffee,” Courfeyrac said but she was probably too far gone to hear him. He turned to Combeferre again, still smiling. Was he always smiling that much, his cheeks must hurt at night. “So, you are going to introduce me to everyone?”

“Yes, of course. Tag along.” Combeferre was actually surprised that none of his other friends had come up to introduce themselves yet but when he turned around he saw that they were occupied with themselves.

Bossuet had apparently hurt himself, so Joly was fussing over him, having pulled out the tiny first aid kit he carried around. Enjolras and Grantaire were both bent over R’s laptop discussing something heatedly but in such a low tone that they were not audible for Combeferre.

The two pairs sat opposite of each other on a table for ten. Eponine and Combeferre had been sitting at another table because Combeferre had been sitting there helping Gavroche with his homework before the rest arrived. The boy had left though, because he was too tired to attend their meeting tonight like he sometimes did.

His friends all looked up when he brought Courfeyrac over to them and Enjolras even did his typical straightening-his-shirt, sitting-up thing. R observed this with a warm smile before he stood up to introduce himself.

“Hi there, you must be Courfeyrac. I’m Grantaire, he/him-pronouns,” he shook Courfeyrac’s hand and the latter nodded and smiled and made a joke that Combeferre didn’t hear because he was too focused on the dimples again but everyone around them chuckled and then Eponine was back and put down Courfeyrac’s tea and took Combeferre’s arm and pulled him away from the rest of them.

In the corner of his eye he saw Courfeyrac looking after them but he tried to focus on Eponine. “Are you alright?”

Eponine laughed. “Of course I am alright. Are you alright?”

Combeferre nodded and sighed. “Yes. I just need to pull myself together a bit.”

“Well, I can take over writing the protocol tonight so you can spend the time dreamily staring at Courfeyrac, if you want?” She offered and though her tone was amused and teasing it was a serious offer and one that came from a place of love.

“You’re the best,” he said, nodding then shaking his head, “and also kind of the worst.”

“Thanks,” she laughed again then looked behind him towards their friends, “there’s a safe pathway now, I think he’s gone to the restroom.”

Eponine steered the two of them back towards the table and then sat them down next to each other so that Combeferre would have to sit opposite of Courfeyrac. She took out her laptop and set it up to write the protocol.

“Did you take over from Combeferre, Eponine?” Enjolras asked sounding not surprised and actually smiling a bit with a glint in his eyes.

This was untypical behavior for Enjolras but he had decided that he supported Combeferre’s crush. He was usually the last person to talk about anything romance-related but when they had left from the meeting with Courfeyrac and Feuilly he had offered Combeferre to talk about it.

And Combeferre had smiled and said something along the lines of “It’s a crush, I don’t know if it’s viable,” and simultaneously congratulated himself on being so obvious that Enjolras had thought it appropriate to address the issue.

It was not that he felt ashamed of this crush. Stuff like this was nothing to feel awkward about. Courfeyrac was attractive, physically and personality-wise and Combeferre was generally interested in dating men.

It was not even a question of reciprocation. His exchanges with Courfeyrac led him to believe that the other man was interested in him as well. They were adults, there was no reason to hide their interest and they didn’t.

The real issue for Combeferre was that this had rarely ever happened to him and never so soon after meeting someone. Romance was far out of his comfort zone just because it had never been in his focus. He had always been focused on himself and reaching a certain point in his life and the love from his family and his friends had given him enough to feel well.

And now romance had come not knocking on the door but kicking it in with a bang. Combeferre was still adjusting to his door being so far open that Courfeyrac had just walked in almost on accident.

“I thought Combeferre’d better focus on something else tonight,” Eponine answered and R laughed, “You mean flirting with the cute guy he brought along?”

“I didn’t exactly bring him along. I mean, Enjolras invited him to come and explain their project.”

“Yeah, so you could flirt with him,” Grantaire said and Enjolras didn’t meet Combeferre’s eyes which was basically a confirmation. He was shaking his head but smiling because how could he not?

Before this conversation could go further, Courfeyrac had returned and Enjolras had started the meeting.

They didn’t have very much to talk about that night.

Grantaire had brought sketches for the postcards they had designed to raise awareness of minority-owned stores and restaurants in different neighborhoods and they were wonderful. He would also take the lead in having them printed which would probably take another two weeks or so.

Joly and Bossuet reported on the petition they were taking care of. They had almost reached 5,000 signatures and were planning to hit up some fairs and markets on the weekend to collect some more. Courfeyrac spoke up at this point to tell them about the open house at his faculty where he’d imagine they’d be very successful. He blushed a bit when Joly thanked him extensively.

And then they had arrived at the point where Enjolras thanked Courfeyrac again for being there and then told the rest of the Amis about their meeting on Sunday – which was mostly for the protocol’s sake because Combeferre was sure that they had already heard all about it from either Enjolras or Combeferre. Then he let Courfeyrac take over.

He explained the project and Combeferre was very occupied with observing him but also his own friends for their reactions. When Courfeyrac had ended his short speech he offered to leave for a moment so they could speak openly so he took up any orders they’d like to place and went to get himself some new tea and a juice for Joly.

Combeferre’s impression had been right; they all generally liked the idea. They had some concerns and questions about the procedure and allocation of tasks but that should not be a hindrance to start this as cooperation.

“Also they seem like great people,” Joly added, “two people who have impressed Enj and ‘Ferre so much in such a short time can’t come from a group of people we would not get along with, right?”

“Very right,” Bossuet chimed in.

“I think this will be a wonderful chance to expand our work and I think the cooperation will benefit both of our groups,” Enjolras said with a smile, “I’ll go and get Courfeyrac so we can ask some of these questions and maybe find a date to bring the groups together.”

When Enjolras had left the table Eponine turned away from her protocol to put her arm around Combeferre’s shoulder. “Are we happy about this evolvement?”

“Yes, of course.”

“So, are you going to make a move? Any kind of move?” They had been talking about this when they had met up last week to ‘lament about being single and gay’.

Combeferre had told Eponine that he was not sure whether this crush on Courfeyrac would turn out to be viable, because he had to get to know him in person first. Eponine had been very understanding about that but also had made him promise to not overthink asking Courfeyrac out should he indeed like him.

“Maybe, yes, I don’t know,” Combeferre answered, “I think I should.”

“I think so, too,” Eponine agreed with a smile and gave his shoulders a squeeze.

Enjolras returned with Courfeyrac who sat down again opposite of Combeferre and smiled at him and _yes, he really should ask him out_. He would.

“So, we decided we’d like to cooperate with _temps_ in this project, there are just some questions left and of course the issue of meeting up all together and agreeing on a schedule,” Enjolras stated. Courfeyrac nodded smiling even broader than before.

Joly and Bossuet marked their concern that they might not be cut out for the kind of acting that was envisioned in the concept: “I feel like as a layperson with very little experience in acting and theater it might be hard to develop a role and do actual improv on stage.”

Courfeyrac nodded understandingly, “I totally get that. It can be hard to develop a role and improv is not everybody’s piece of cake. But working stuff like this out as a group helps a lot more than you’d originally think. Our project is as much about the process as it is about the final product so I’m confident that we will find a way to have everyone on stage who wants to be on stage in a way that works for them.”

Combeferre wasn’t sure whether it was due to his words or his charm that Courfeyrac had this soothing and energizing effect on those around him. He answered all their questions with understanding, an offer of compromise and a promise to work things out together. Meanwhile he also succeeded in making it all seem like the best idea ever encapsulating his passion for the project in every answer.

When they had finished their Q&A Courfeyrac made some suggestions for dates to bring the groups together. _temps dramatiques_ had had their meeting the night before and agreed on a few dates everybody was able to block until a decision was made. Because their meeting nights did not match up it was a bit complicated but soon they agreed on the Sunday after next.

“Great,” Courfeyrac said, “where? We are usually meeting at the Corinthe because two of us used to work there. We could probably ask to get the back room for us,” he suggested.

“Oh, I loved the Corinthe when I was a student,” Grantaire said and with a wink to Joly and Bossuet, “do you remember the cute bartender, she was always flirting with one or two of you.”

“God, that was years ago,” Joly answered, laughing. He leapt into a story about how Bossuet had spilt his whole drink in his lap and Combeferre had heard this one before but Courfeyrac was listening intently and laughing and making a pun. He fit right into Combeferre’s little group of friends.

“So, the Corinthe it is,” Enjolras said with a nod towards Eponine who had already put it in the protocol. “That marks the end of tonight’s meeting, I think. Anything left to say?” Everybody shook their heads, so Eponine read out the official ending time and then shut the laptop with a thud.

Usually the Amis stayed together for a bit longer on meeting nights just to catch up and spend some time together. Courfeyrac integrated himself perfectly when he started talking to Grantaire about his art for the postcards.

Combeferre headed over to Enjolras, “So, you are now playing wingman for me?” he asked teasingly. Enjolras pulled a face.

“I’m shocked you would accuse me of such things,” he answered but a smile betrayed his tone, “I don’t know. I like him, I think. And you seem to like him, too.”

“I’m not mad, Enj,” Combeferre told his best friend, “I’ll ask him out.”

“Great,” Enjolras smiled at him whole-heartedly, “he fits right, you know?”

Combeferre looked at Courfeyrac who by now had included the rest of the group in his and Grantaire’s conversation, “I think so, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello lovely people!
> 
> you might have seen that i finally decided on what length this fic will have! there will be two more chapters and then an epilogue, yay :)
> 
> thank you especially to Kerstin for beta'ing and to athena2049 whose comments always make me smile!
> 
> until next time, everyone stay safe and take care!  
> Jay :)


	7. paper napkin butterflies

It was an almost typical day of hanging out at Courfeyrac’s and Marius’ place. Cosette and Marius were sitting in the loveseat, legs intertwined, laughing with Jehan who was lounging on the sofa braiding their own hair.

Queen was playing in the background because Courfeyrac was hyping himself up and this was his jam for situations such as these, re: putting on a fashion show of all his favorite outfits to have his friends help him decide what to wear on his date.

They were all very unhelpful.

Marius didn’t have any sense of appropriate clothing. He was happy wearing dark blue jeans and white (dress) shirts for any and all purposes which was fine but also made him a bad advisor for anything fashion-related.

Jehan had decided that they liked the first outfit best and had refused to even look at the other things Courfeyrac had pulled from his overstuffed wardrobe.

Cosette was doing the opposite: whatever he was wearing she said, “You look awesome, Courf, you can totally wear that.”

He was currently in his room changing into his eighth outfit and Jehan shouted, “Just change back into the first one! There’s a reason you wanted to wear that first!”

Courfeyrac sighed and stopped in his tracks. He looked around in his clothes-covered room. The first outfit he had picked had been his usual all day, every day cuffed black jeans combined with a light grey t-shirt with a chest pocket and an unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt on top. It was comfortable and it suited him very well.

Jehan was right, he knew that, but worrying about his outfit gave him a welcome outlet for the nervousness he felt towards the evening.

Combeferre and him had agreed to meet at Combeferre’s place. He would cook dinner for them and Courfeyrac would bring stuff to make dessert together because he was a menace when it came to cooking but his mother had taught him well when it came to sweet treats.

His tote bag was already packed with everything they’d need for apple crumble. It was easy to prepare, crumbles were fun to make and it tasted heavenly. They had checked in with each other about dietary restrictions and discovered they were both vegetarians and both preferred oat milk over cow milk but couldn’t imagine life without cheese.

“But if I accept this as a truth, Jehan, then what am I supposed to do for the two hours I still have to let pass before it would begin to be appropriate to leave?” Courfeyrac asked heading back to the living room still wearing the pants from outfit number seven but nothing else.

“You could also just wear this, you know?” Marius said which was a very Marius attempt of a joke that Courf and Jehan answered with a deadpan look while Cosette pressed a kiss on his cheek, “We got to work on your jokes, my love.”

“You could teach me how to play French tarot,” Jehan proposed, tying their hair together with a silk ribbon, “I might have mentioned tarot to Montparnasse so he invited me out to play with him and his friends.”

“You weren’t talking about French tarot, though, were you?” Cosette asked with an amused smile.

“No, I was obviously talking about cartomancy, which I can’t believe he did not understand,” Jehan said, sounding exasperated, “but it’s too late to tell him that _now_.”

“Alright,” Cosette laughed, sitting up, detangling herself from her boyfriend, “do you guys have a tarot deck?”

“Yes, somewhere,” Marius answered, pulling himself and Cosette up from their seat, “I used to play this with my friends at boarding school, I still got the deck, I think.”

“You go search for that, I will put on a shirt and make some coffee,” Courfeyrac said.

“Tea, please,” Jehan called out, left alone in the living room, “and thank you all!”

***

Courfeyrac took a deep breath before knocking on Combeferre’s apartment door. He had run into someone at the front door and had then slowly made his way up the three flights of stairs, because he was a few minutes early and while he _detested_ being late he also _hated_ being early.

As an answer to his knock he heard clattering and clanking from the inside of the apartment. A minute or so later Combeferre opened the door, looking a bit distressed but smiling with his whole face.

He was wearing an apron that said _oh crèpe!_ that was covered in flour. “Hi,” he said, sounding a bit breathless, “Please, come in.”

“Hi,” Courfeyrac answered stepping into the place, “is everything alright? I heard some noise.”

“Oh, um, yes. I get clumsy when I’m nervous,” Combeferre answered, taking the tote bag from Courfeyrac and gesturing at the coat rack, “Do I need to put something in the fridge?”

“Oh yes. There’s ice cream in there, so I hope you have some room in the freezer,” he followed Combeferre out of the little hallway through a living room into the kitchen.

It was a nice flat as far as Courfeyrac could tell from the quick look-over he gave each room. All rooms were very homely, especially the kitchen, because it was a bit messy in the way kitchens were supposed to be when someone was cooking in them at the time.

Also, it smelled really good. There were two pots on the stove and another one in the oven. In the sink Courfeyrac could see dishes and cutlery that looked like they had been piled up there hastily.

Combeferre put the ice cream from Courfeyrac’s bag in the freezer then turned around to him. He saw him looking at the sink and smiled again, “I dropped this when I heard you knock, so I just kind of threw it into the sink, you know?”

“I would have probably done the same but with more bleeding and less smiling,” Courfeyrac answered, smiling as well, “Can I do anything to help? I am absolutely unable to cook but I can set the table or something.”

“If you want to, you can find everything in the cupboard next do the door, but you can also just bide your time and I’ll do it, I don’t mind,” Combeferre offered while taking off the lid of one of the pots and stirring something. The smell of tomatoes filled the whole room, Courfeyrac’s mouth started watering.

He turned around to the cupboard and opened one of the doors – plates, very good. “Regular plates or do we need something specific?”

“Regular plates, nothing specific or fancy.”

“Okay, so to put my question more directly: What’s for dinner? It smells really nice.”

“I was at the market today and found some beautiful aubergines, so I thought I’d bake them and make some gnocchi and tomato sauce to go with it,” Combeferre explained, “speaking about gnocchi, can you hand me a big bowl?”

He turned around to Courfeyrac and the latter couldn’t help but smile, because he had pulled his glasses down to the tip of his nose so he could look over them as they were fogged from the steam coming from the pots. He looked adorable.

“Yes, of course, this one?” Courfeyrac took out the only bowl he would deem ‘big’ from the cupboard.

“Perfect, thank you,” Combeferre said and turned towards the stove to start removing the gnocchi from the water and putting them into the bowl.

Courfeyrac, in the meantime, finished setting the table then looking at his work, “Do you have napkins?”

“Uhm, yes, I think. If I do then they are in the drawer next to the fridge. I only use those, when my grandmother or my parents come to visit me,” he told Courfeyrac, “my mother manages a restaurant so she places great value on things like these. But I think she notices that I had the same batch of paper napkins for a few years.”

“Oh, my mother complained that I never exchanged the place mats in our kitchen in the last five years or so but we only ever use them, when she’s around, so…” he left the rest of the sentence hang in the air.

There were exactly three paper napkins in the drawer Combeferre had pointed at. Courfeyrac took out two of them and sat down at the table, “I don’t really care for napkins in general but my friend Jehan taught me some origami a little while ago, so I want to use this opportunity to impress you with my crafty-ness.”

“I don’t think that’s necessary, but don’t let that stop you,” Combeferre answered with a soft smile, “I am easy to impress with anything crafty, because I have no talent creating things with my hands.”

“I would put cooking in the category of ‘creating things with your hands’”, Courfeyrac mused, starting to fold and unfold the napkin strategically.

“Technically, you are right, but then almost all of human labor is done with the hands,” Combeferre followed his line of argumentation, “I think cooking is more of a sensual creation, because you need to use your sense of touch, smell and taste to create an enjoyable meal.”

“Okay, I take that point. So, if you’re not crafty, what are you doing with all the time you are not spending crocheting or woodworking?”

“Probably reading,” Combeferre answered, bringing the bowl with the gnocchi to the table “Is this a butterfly or a moth?” he asked upon seeing Courfeyrac’s creation.

“You tell me, you’re the expert.”

Combeferre smiled at him again, “I’m afraid I am at my wit’s end when it comes to paper napkin Lepidoptera.” He went back to open the oven and take out the pot with the aubergines. A cloud of steam spread out in the kitchen and filled it with a moist warmth and the smell of molten cheese and garlic.

“How did you find your way to become an expert on Lepidoptera? Did you always want to be a entomologist?” Courfeyrac asked, leaning back in the chair and watching Combeferre move swiftly through his kitchen. There was a certain kind of grace in his movements while he filled the sauce in another bowl and plated the aubergine.

“I actually did not want to become an entomologist until I was well on my way to be an entomologist,” Combeferre answered, looking over to his guest, “I did a bachelor’s program in zoology and we had one professor whose favorite topic was insects. He was one of the best teachers I ever had so I took most of his classes.”

Combeferre brought the rest of the food to the table. “Then in the last semester break of my bachelor’s I interned at the Parc de Berféré. They have a program to raise environmental consciousness and a so-called butterfly house –“

“I’m sorry to interrupt but what defines a ‘so-called butterfly house’ in contrast to a regular butterfly house?” Courfeyrac interjected.

Combeferre laughed, “There are no regular butterfly houses; they are all a lie. In most of them there are about as many moths as there are butterflies but since moths have a bad rep they are never mentioned.”

“Of course,” Courfeyrac answered with a fond smile on his face, “So this internship made you want to be an entomologist?”

“Basically, yes. I just started reading up on insects and they are incredible and incredibly important for our environment and when there came the time for me to decide what to do for my master’s degree I specialized in entomology and then that way led me to Lepidoptera.”

Combeferre had put everything on the table when he noticed, “I didn’t even offer you something to drink up until now. What can I give you? Water? Wine? I don’t think I have much else.”

“Water and wine are both absolutely fine,” Courfeyrac answered, “don’t worry. I’d have told you before I’d have died of thirst.”

“I kind of forgot that we do not know each other that well. I mean…” he frowned at his own words, “most of the people who visit me here are my friends who just get themselves water when they are here. I am not really used to other visitors.”

“Don’t worry,” Courfeyrac said again, laughing a bit.

Combeferre gave him another smile, filling a carafe with water and getting a bottle of wine from his pantry. He put both on the table before vanishing in the living room for a second to return with two claret glasses.

“I own exactly two nice wine glasses, which is to blame on Eponine and her refusal to drink red wine from anything else than claret glasses,” Combeferre chatted, setting one of the glasses next to Courfeyrac’s plate and the other next to his own.

He took a corkscrew from a drawer then turned around to the table and stared at it for a second as if counting off in his head what he needed to do before sitting down. As if he just remembered that he had a physical body he looked down on himself and removed the apron before finally sitting down.

During dinner they talked a lot. Courfeyrac at times felt as if he was talking too much about himself, before he remembered that this was a date and Combeferre’s questions were aiming at getting Courfeyrac to talk about himself. Courf was of course reciprocating this and they went through all kinds of topics from childhood injuries and resulting scars to their academic work.

“So, what are you working on for your PhD?” Combeferre asked when they were putting together the dishes so they would have enough room on the table to prepare the apple crumble.

“The working title is ‘history of gender subversion and gender diversity in Shakespeare’s plays and derivative modern works’,” Courfeyrac answered, emptying out his tote bag on the table, “which sounds very boring, because I have not yet picked a juicy quote to actually title it.”

“I wrote my PhD thesis on butterfly feces, which was also very interesting but in comparison yours is not half bad.”

“That sounds awful, actually, no offense,” Courfeyrac laughed, pulling a face. Combeferre nodded understandingly.

“Your topic seems way more suitable for small talk and conversations while preparing food, I admit,” he said smiling warmly, “so, tell me more about it. What are the modern derivative works you are writing about?”

Courfeyrac leapt into a whole explanation about YA novels, the gay chaos that was _Were the World Mine_ and by the time they were crumbling the dough onto the apples they had started listening to the cast recording of _& Juliet_.

Combeferre let Courfeyrac fare as he liked, his patience and genuine curiosity about the things Courfeyrac was passionate about were melting the latter’s heart layer by layer – as if he had not been on his best way to do so anyways.

While the apple crumble baked he tried to teach Combeferre some of the origami Jehan had taught him, so Combeferre could try and impress his mother with it the next time she came over to visit. His fingers were all thumbs, however.

“I’ll just have to come over and help you with this when your mother is in town,” Courfeyrac offered, when it became evident that it was hopeless. He only noticed the peremptoriness his words presumed after they had left his mouth.

“I fear she would like you better than me, if you did that,” Combeferre answered brushing past what could have been an awkward moment, laughing, “I could bring you some new place mats, so our chances with the other’s mother are even.”

“Sounds fair.”

They passed the rest of the time waiting for the apple crumble by Combeferre giving Courfeyrac a tour of the flat. It was a very nice apartment for one person. Granted, the bedroom was so tiny, that only Combeferre’s bed, his wardrobe and a tiny nightstand fit into the narrow space but to make up for this he had a living room and a decent sized kitchen.

When the kitchen timer rang they went to get some dessert and settled on the sofa for eating it. Only after finishing their plates did they notice that they had forgotten all about the ice cream.

“Let’s just keep it for next time,” Combeferre suggested, his hand having found its way into Courfeyrac’s, intertwining their fingers.

“Next time sounds good,” Courfeyrac answered and squeezed his hand tenderly and tentatively leaning himself a bit in Combeferre’s direction. He responded by inching a bit closer himself.

“I think there’s something more important that shouldn’t wait ‘til next time,” Courfeyrac said and it was barely more than a whisper, because he feared it would ruin the anticipation that was so very present in this moment, “Kiss me?”

“Your wish is my command,” Combeferre answered and he could have said literally anything but that to make Courf happy.

“God, I hate this phrase,” he stated, shaking his head but still smiling.

“Yeah, I don’t know why I said that either,” Combeferre admitted, chuckling, “How about I kiss you now instead of stating platitudes?”

“That would be very much appreciated.”

So he did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello awesome people!
> 
> i had so much fun writing this chapter, i hope you enjoyed it as well :)  
> i chose to use aubergine instead of eggplant, because i hate the word eggplant for some irrational reason and they are in france so i don't care that i don't speak french and they don't speak french in this story, they can use the french word.
> 
> as always a shoutout to my beautiful beta-reader Kerstin! <3
> 
> until next time, everyone stay safe and take care,  
> Jay :)


	8. feels like one of those moments

Combeferre had been at the Corinthe once before when he had still been a student. It was a big place with a free-spirit atmosphere and cheap beer and wine – students were the perfect target demographic for them. The more outgoing of his friends – actually, everyone but Enjolras and him – had been there regularly a few years back.

According to Courfeyrac the Corinthe had not changed much compared to the time Combeferre remembered it from. _temps dramatiques_ had been meeting there since their founding, mostly for logistical reasons because two of them – Musichetta and Feuilly – had been working there at the time and they had been allowed to use the backroom for rehearsals before they had found a theater to perform at and they were still on very friendly terms with the owners.

Combeferre arrived at the Corinthe together witch Courfeyrac, Marius and Cosette. He had been over at Courfeyrac’s place for breakfast and Cosette and Marius had come back from having breakfast with Cosette’s father around noon, so they had headed out together.

Seeing those two together, Combeferre understood what Courfeyrac had meant when he had talked about them. They were a kind of fairytale-y couple with a love at first sight story behind them. Both of them were very kind people, they had a softness about them that was instantly comforting.

Marius was a bit awkward and shy at first. Still, one couldn’t help but notice the way his shell broke apart under the look and touch of the people he was most connected to. The longer they spent together the more easy-going his behavior seemed to get.

When they arrived, the other members of _temps dramatiques_ were already there. Combeferre saw Feuilly as soon as he entered the bar and with him were a tall very muscular guy who, according to Courfeyrac’s descriptions, was Bahorel as well as a curvy woman with dark hair who supposedly was Musichetta. Also with them was Jehan, who Combeferre recognized easily from the photograph of them that was stuck to Courfeyrac’s fridge.

There was a round of “hey!”s when the groups merged and Combeferre introduced himself to everyone he had not met before, shaking hands, exchanging names and the like. They were a bit earlier than the Amis were set to arrive so they could welcome them warmly and with the room prepared – Courfeyrac had told him that whoever wanted to use the backroom usually had to sweep and wipe through it first.

“Michele and Simone usually only use it to store some stuff there, because actually renting it out would make it harder to declare on their tax report,” Musichetta explained to Combeferre, “I discussed this thoroughly with them when I was still working here and they always said something like, ‘Child, if you need the room, use it but we won’t take no money for it’, so...”

“So we took the room and used it extensively for free and are therefore forever indebted to them and will never have our meetings elsewhere,” Bahorel added, laughing.

“Well, we’ll go and set up the room. Maybe you and Combeferre want to stay here so the arriving folks will see someone they know,” Feuilly proposed to Courfeyrac who nodded in agreement after exchanging a glance with Combeferre.

Everyone except Jehan moved on to either the backroom or behind the bar – apparently Musichetta was still welcome to go there whenever she wanted – to get some drinks and snacks for them, “What can I get you, Combeferre?”

“Do you have green tea?” Musichetta nodded with a smile and vanished in the backroom behind the bar.

“Another tea drinker, thank God,” Jehan commented, “I am the only one who drinks tea in this circle of friends, really. Courf sometimes joins me for a cup or two but everybody else seems to be addicted to coffee or, well, Marius likes neither – he only drinks hot chocolate.”

“I also drink coffee,” Combeferre explained sharing a smile with Courfeyrac. They seemed to be having the same thought of Eponine saying something very similar about Courf when they first met, “but only for breakfast. Otherwise I prefer tea.”

“I think some of our friends take the issue of hot beverages entirely too seriously,” Courfeyrac noted smiling cheekily, “I wonder if we should set up Eponine and Jehan for a coffee vs. tea debate.”

“I dare you to do it,” Jehan replied, mockingly lifting their arms as if they wanted to box someone. They did not look dangerous in any way but maybe this was also just a side-effect of them smiling sunnily while doing it. All three of them laughed then Jehan asked, “Is Eponine someone we will be meeting today?”

“Yes,” Combeferre answered, “she’s also the only one of us who has seen works of yours before. She likes to take her brother to plays and shows and he also enjoyed your work. I think he’ll even tag along tonight. He’s a few years younger than the rest of us but he likes to participate in our projects when he can.”

“Oh, that would be lovely. We seldom – if ever – have people working with us who are younger than we are. And most of them are students of Courfeyrac anyways, theatre kids usually dig projects like ours and some only come for Courf and his cute black locks,” Jehan teased his friend.

Courfeyrac was blushing the slightest bit under Combeferre’s questioning gaze, “That is entirely exaggerated,” he claimed, “I usually promote our projects during my lessons and in the faculty when we are having open calls and while there has been the occasional student of mine taking part in our projects, it’s mostly due to theatre departments being hella queer and less with me, personally.”

“Let’s say he’s our people’s-magnet,” Jehan proposed as a compromise. Courfeyrac took that. It was nice to see the two of them kind of bickering and Combeferre only threw in a few questions and comments while they told him stories about their temporary colleagues – people who had been with them for one or two projects but did not join their core team.

Their anecdotes were very entertaining and kept them occupied until the front door of the café opened and Combeferre saw Eponine, Gavroche, Grantaire and Enjolras wandering in. They spotted Combeferre, Courfeyrac and Jehan instantly and headed over to them. There was another round of hellos and introductions as they all introduced themselves.

“Joly and Bossuet are going to be here in a few minutes. They had trouble finding a parking spot around here apparently. Joly didn’t want to take public transport because there has apparently been a measles outbreak at a school in this district or something,” Eponine informed them.

“Well, I guess you can never be too careful with stuff like that,” Jehan commented. Grantaire gave them a big smile for that, “Joly will love you.” Jehan smiled happily at that and offered to take the four of them to the back room. So, Combeferre and Courfeyrac were left alone at the bar, seeing their friends go off together.

“This feels like one of those moments that will be very important someday, you know?” Courfeyrac asked after a moment of silence. He was expressing exactly what Combeferre was feeling as well.

“Yes, I know exactly what you mean,” he laid one arm around Courfeyrac who responded by turning around to face him, “I feel like I am putting together a puzzle and I finally figured out where to put every piece, so now I can do it, well, we can do it.”

“That’s very sappy,” Courfeyrac teased him but it seemed like a weak attempt, “I think you are right. I don’t know how we – all of us – never met before but it feels like we kind of belong together.”

Combeferre smiled at him and Courfeyrac mirrored his expression, “It does.”

The door to the bar opened again and Combeferre instantly heard Joly’s worried flood of words. Apparently Bossuet had run into a traffic sign face-first because he hadn’t been looking but had not seriously hurt himself, “I’m fine, my love, don’t worry. Look, there are ‘Ferre and Courfeyrac.”

He pointed at them, apparently happy to have found something to deter Joly from fussing over him. They said their hellos and then made their way to the backroom together. Courfeyrac asked Bossuet whether he was okay and he insisted he was fine. Combeferre still offered to go and get a cooling pack at the bar for him and Joly pressed his boyfriend to do so.

Combeferre went to the bar and got the icepack after explaining what he needed it for and assuring the bartender that there was a medical professional with them so they didn’t need to worry. When he came to the back room he was greeted by a wonderful chaos of his and Courfeyrac’s friends mixed together, talking and laughing.

People had split up into groups: Joly and Bossuet were standing together with R, Bahorel and Musichetta. When Combeferre went over to them to hand the ice pack to Bossuet he got from their conversation that Joly and Bossuet knew Musichetta back from their days going out to drink at the Corinthe.

Musichetta was telling Bahorel how she used to flirt with the both of them but never felt like they reciprocated her interest and the two of them were blushing and flushing and stuttering a bit. R, standing right next to them, seemed to have a lot of fun watching his best friends so nervous over her.

Combeferre left them to this and passed the group of Feuilly, Enjolras, Cosette and Marius who seemed to be very deep in a discussion about how the Napoleonic wars were taught in French high schools and whether updating school books or eliminating school books was a path for the future. The discussion seemed rather heated – which was something that happened a lot when Enjolras got fired up. Still, Marius was apparently holding his ground very well, though he was probably holding his girlfriend’s hand even stronger.

The last group that had come together was made up of Eponine, her brother, Courfeyrac and Jehan. Combeferre joined them, picking up a cup of tea from the table in the middle of the room on his way over. When he entered the conversation they were talking about _temps_ last project.

Gavroche had been really impressed by their project and he gave an honest and ecstatic review about how he had liked it. He had a soft spot for poetry that he rarely admitted but facing a poet and a Shakespeare expert he apparently was able to overcome his usual inhibitions.

Eponine listened to their conversation with a smile on her face and some pride showing whenever she looked at her brother. Combeferre noticed that she also kept throwing glances at Cosette. He gently nudged her with his elbow and gave her a smile, “Did you talk to her yet?”

Eponine shook her head very subtly, turning away from the others to talk only to Combeferre and not deter her brother, Jehan or Courfeyrac from what had turned into a heated discussion about homoeroticism in Shakespeare’s works.

“No. I need a second to adjust to the fact that she is apparently very much in love with a dude. You will have to hear me whine about this for a bit longer, even though you are not single anymore, you know? It’s still you duty.”

Combeferre gave her a mocking salute, “It’s always a pleasure to listen to your laments.”

“I’ll hold you to it,” Eponine said, giving him a rare side-hug. “These groups mixed eerily well, don’t you think?”

“Yes, it’s nice, isn’t it?”

“That’s for time to tell, I guess.” Eponine answered with a shrug, turning back around to her brother, Jehan and Courfeyrac. They had meandered in conversation topics and had apparently come to talk about music and local bands. Jehan was telling a story about a concert they had been to lately with a friend that had been held in the living room of someone with about fifteen people.

“You must’ve seen a friend of Eponine there; I think ‘Parnasse told me about this concert, right Ep?” Gavroche asked his sister.

“Montparnasse?” Jehan asked instead. “He was the friend I was there with.”

“You know Montparnasse?” Eponine blurted out. Combeferre could see that Eponine was genuinely surprised. “No offense, you seem not exactly ‘Parnasse’s type of person. You seem so…soft,” she said.

Jehan took no offense, they seemed happy about Eponine’s assessment, “Oh, yes, I think I am soft. I _hope_ I am soft,” they laughed warmly, “I still hang out with Monty, though, he’s got a very well-hidden soft side. How do you guys know him?”

Eponine still looked a bit dumb-founded. Gavroche seemed equally surprised but caught himself sooner, “He lets you call him Monty?”

Combeferre checked out of their conversation, locking eyes with Courfeyrac who did the same. They retracted from their friends, Combeferre went to fill up his empty mug with more tea and Courfeyrac got himself a beignet.

The other groups had rearranged; Feuilly and Enjolras had joined Grantaire and Bahorel who were talking about their tattoos judging by them showing their ink to each other. Cosette and Marius were talking to Joly and Bossuet, who were sitting next to Musichetta who had both of their attention on her.

“Looks like more people hit it off than us,” Courfeyrac observed nodding towards the three of them, “do you think that’s something that could happen? ‘Chetta deserves the world, you know?”

“I don’t know, they have been a couple for a few years. They are sometimes crushing on people together and I think they are not strictly monogamous,” Combeferre answered, watching his friends as well – subtly, he hoped.

“Alright, well,” Courfeyrac leaned his shoulder on his softly, “are we going to be monogamous?” Combeferre turned around to him which caused Courfeyrac to rattle off, “I know this relationship is only, like, a week old but we have not talked about this before and I think now is a good time as ever and I just wanted to know how serious you think you want this relationship to get and what kind of commitment we expect from each other.”

“Take a moment to breathe, please,” Combeferre interjected, “It’s good that you are bringing this up. I am not polyamorous and I would like to commit to you monogamously, looking where this leads, if that is what you want as well.”

Courfeyrac theatrically took an extra deep breath before answering. Combeferre rolled his eyes at him but they were both smiling, Courfeyrac’s dimple was showing, “Yes, that’s what I want as well.”

“Perfect,” he intertwined their fingers and Courfeyrac gave his hand a squeeze, “so, important follow-up info: I hate the word boyfriend, so I would prefer to refer to each other as partners. Is that okay for you?”

Courfeyrac laughed in the most charming way, “That’s…yes, of course that’s okay for me.”

“You seem like you wanted to say something else as well,” Combeferre inquired curiously.

“Yes, it just…it seems like a very you-thing, you know?” Courfeyrac explained, “I also think I couldn’t call you my boyfriend without thinking how bad it fits you,” he laughed softly again, taking Combeferre’s other hand and intertwining those fingers as well, “partner however, yes, I think I’ll need no time to adjust to that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello wonderful people!
> 
> i hope you are all staying safe in these troubling times, where i am from we are going into the second big wave of covid-cases and the general anxiousness is rising again. 
> 
> on a positive note: i'm going to the theatre tonight, for the first time since the beginning of march (it's social-distanced and conforming to covid-rules, of course) and i am so happy. i really missed theatre :(
> 
> i hope you are finding some light in the current situation as well :)
> 
> the last chapter/epilogue will be up next week!
> 
> until then, everybody stay safe and take care,  
> Jay :)
> 
> ps: i promise i'll figure out how to link stuff properly until next time so i can give you all the extra info and hc's that i have for this fic :)


	9. epilogue - the most important day

_several months later_

Courfeyrac had always doubted the expressions _best day of one’s life_ and _most important day of one’s life_. How could one know beforehand which day would be the best or most important one out of the thousands of days one lived? Even retrospectively it was hard to bestow such a title on a single concatenation of 24 hours.

Also, he thought to himself often, the two labels did not necessarily overlap. A day could be important without being even generally good. Bad days were sometimes just as important as good ones. Five years ago, when Feuilly had almost died of appendicitis after dragging himself to work with a stomachache for a week, this day had not been good but _very_ important.

Vice versa good days were sometimes not all that important. Spending a day in bed, eating only breakfast foods, watching space documentaries and cuddling with Combeferre was a recipe for a really good day but in the grand scheme of things this day was not more important than a random Tuesday spent researching in the library and coming home to take-out brought by Enjolras who was ranting in the kitchen.

The special day always referred to by these expressions was, of course, one’s wedding. As Enjolras had put it perfectly: “Framing the wedding day as the most important day of an individual’s life just supports the notion that romantic love is what everyone should be chasing after and undermines other ideas of love and companionship.”

Marius had made the mistake to use this phrase once in Enjolras’ proximity, less out of support for the idea and more so because it was a figure of speech. Now, he just referred to the wedding as ‘the special day’, while Courfeyrac had chosen ‘the day it will finally be over’ as a title because in all honesty, he was done with the stressful job of being the best man.

He loved Marius and Cosette and he was really happy to help but his best friend had basically turned into a nervous wreck the closer the wedding date came as though there was a possibility of Cosette saying ‘no’ after putting up with him lovingly for more than five years. Had it not been for the calmness and clarity Combeferre gave Courfeyrac the latter had probably ended up upsetting Marius even further.

Now, the day had finally come and – just like Courfeyrac had predicted – everything was going splendidly. Cosette looked beautiful, Marius cleaned up very nice in his tailored suit and everyone was on their best behavior under the watchful eyes of Cosette’s dad who was the only other guest except for their friends. Neither the bride nor the groom had a big or extended family – at least not a biological one.

After the ceremony at town hall they went to the restaurant Musichetta worked at and that they had rented for the day. It was a beautiful little bistro that fit all of them nicely. Chetta’s kitchen team had prepared a heavenly meal only topped by the unbelievable croquembouche they had made as wedding cake.

Cosette and Marius couldn’t stop smiling and their happiness infected everyone else. People were dancing in one corner of the restaurant, having pushed the tables to the side with Musichetta’s blessing. Courfeyrac was currently taking a break from being up on his feet all day when Combeferre came to join him. He sat down next to him, taking his hand in his and pressing a light kiss to his knuckles.

Courfeyrac turned to him, smiling, “We should do this all the time.”

“I hope you mean parties like these and not weddings,” Combeferre answered with a teasing smile, “because this will probably be a rare occasion, given our group of friends.”

“Well, more like: given our group of friends and France’s stance on polygamy, the gender binary and recognizing non-romantic committed relationships. If Jehan could get their gender recognized as non-binary they may be open to thinking about marriage. And I’m pretty sure Joly, Bossuet and Musichetta would love to get married. Even Enjolras would possibly be willing to officially label his and Grantaire’s relationship if they were able to use a label more fitting to them than husband and husband.”

“I wish they could,” Combeferre said, laying his arm around Courfeyrac’s shoulder and pulling him closer. Courf nuzzled himself into Ferre’s neck, “Yeah, me too.”

“Maybe we should do a campaign for marriage equality beyond same-sex marriage as our next project,” Combeferre proposed, pressing a kiss to his partner’s hair.

“That sounds lovely. We could look up laws and religious concessions for polygamy and combine this with wedding vows. We could hold actual ceremonies with throuples and…”

“I see, I struck a nerve, do you need your notebook to write that down?” Combeferre adjusted his position a bit to pull out Courfeyrac’s tiny notebook and a pen out of his jacket pocket.

“You brought this?” Courfeyrac looked up to him wonderingly.

“I always expect you to have great ideas, so I like to be prepared.”

Courfeyrac felt like someone tugged on his heartstrings. “God, I love you.”

“I don’t think God has anything to do with it,” Combeferre stated but his facial expression was mirroring Courfeyrac’s happy smile, “I love you, too.”

This day, like many others, felt like one of the best or one of the most important days while it lasted. In retrospect it did not have a great influence on Courfeyrac’s life other than the fact that he remembered it fondly and had spent basically the whole day with no one but the people he loved most dearly in the world, which was all he ever needed, really.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello lovely people!
> 
> so, this is the end. what do you think?  
> i really loved writing this story and i fell in love with all the characters all over again.
> 
> there are a few things i wanted to share with you before i can consider this done so:
> 
> 1\. there's a playlist i made for this fic and that i listened to while writing, you can find it on my tumblr: https://thisisjaybaker.tumblr.com/post/632716977191944192/the-internet-was-a-mistake-playlist
> 
> 2\. a few headcanons for the characters in this fic:  
> • Musichetta is a chef and she’s commanding her kitchen with a loving, stern hand.   
> • Feuilly is a social worker doing street work and night shifts at a shelter for the homeless.  
> • Gavroche is trans. He had a phase of trying to be extra ‚manly‘ but has left that behind and grown more comfortable with being a dude who’s into poetry. He connected very well to Jehan and the two of them are now hanging out a lot.  
> • Enjolras and Grantaire are in a queer-platonic relationship. Enj is aroace, R identifies as queer (period), because it gives him anxiety to try and disseminate his own feelings more thoroughly than that.  
> • Courfeyrac’s last name in this fic is ‘Corbin’ which is French for ‘little raven’.   
> • Courfeyrac and Combeferre have a song and it’s ‘Sound Of An Orchestra’ by MIKA.
> 
> that's all, i think :)
> 
> thank you all for reading this story, for leaving kudos and for commenting! i hope you enjoyed this as much as i did! :)  
> also, lots of gratitude and love to Kerstin (@Tegami here on ao3) who was my beta-reader/personal cheerleader for this fic <3
> 
> as always, everyone stay safe and take!  
> Jay :)
> 
> ps: as you all probably noticed, i did not figure out how to link properly but i have no idea what i keep doing wrong, so if someone knows how to do it, please tell me (?) :)


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